The Genesis creation
account has been a stumbling block for both Christians and non-Christians. A common
objection to even considering the Christian faith has been, “I tried to read
the Bible, but I just couldn’t get past the first chapter Genesis.” Sadly, the
controversy that has come with these opening chapters of the Bible has kept
countless people from ever hearing the important parts that come later; the
truth about Christ has been hidden by misunderstandings about the creation
account. Misconceptions about Genesis have also kept many Christians from studying
science, creating a mistrust of science in the Christian community. As stated
in the January 9th post on this blog, “When interpreted correctly, Christian scripture and nature
should be in harmony. God created the universe and inspired the Bible, so both
should agree.” If we read
the Genesis creation account correctly, it doesn’t have to be a barrier to either
science or Christianity.
In order to understand
what a particular text is telling us, we need to know what the author meant to
communicate, as well as what it meant to the original audience. Genesis was not
originally written just for us. It had to make sense to
every person reading it throughout history. It was written in a different
language, in a different cultural background, and originally for a different
people group. We have to be careful not to impose our cultural understanding on
the text. Scripture is inerrant, but our interpretation of it is not. We need
to be humble in our claims of what Genesis (and any other text) is teaching.
Scholars have been
analyzing Genesis for thousands of years and there is no conclusion as to the one correct way to interpret the
creation account. There are several possible interpretations that are not
“literal”; many theologians take the account to be figurative. The main purpose
of this article is to show skeptics, especially those that may have been turned
off by Genesis in the past, that the Biblical creation account doesn’t have to
be read as six consecutive 24 hour days and that the text is consistent with
the earth being 4.5 billion years old.
It is important to realize that those who advocate
long periods of time for the six “days” of creation are not saying that the
context requires that these be
understood as periods of time. They are simply saying that the context does not
clearly specify for us one meaning of day
or another, and if convincing data about the age of the earth, drawn from many
different disciplines and giving similar answers, convinces us that the earth
is billions of years old, then this possible interpretation of day as a long period of time may be the
best interpretation to adopt.[1]
Historically, most
scholars have emphasized that the Genesis creation account does not specify the
date or the time period over which the creation took place. The view that the earth
is 6000 to 10,000 years old is not taught in the Bible. The 6000 year date came
from Archbishop James Usher in the seventeenth century and almost no
evangelical scholar today holds this view. The earliest commentaries on Genesis
from first century Jewish scholars show a mix of views on the age of the earth
and 24-hour creation days. Philo wrote that the six days are figurative and are
a metaphor for order and completeness. Josephus was undecided about the meaning
of the expression “one day.” Early Christian writings on the subject were also
inconclusive and open to several views. Justin Martyr and Irenaeus suggested
that the “days” could be thousand year epochs. Clement of Alexandria echoed
Philo’s teaching. Augustine wrote quite a bit about the creation days and
concluded that the Genesis creation day is different from our understanding of
a day.
Except for Augustine, the early church leaders
expressed their views [on the Genesis creation account] tentatively. There is
no indication that they sharply debated the issue or took a dogmatic stance. Instead,
they charitably tolerated a diversity of views.[2]
Genesis is more about
theology than it is about science. Since the Bible is a theological text, the
emphasis is about God and what He wants us to know about Him. The crucial,
undebatable points of Genesis are as follows:
1. God is the creator of the universe.
2. Creation (nature) is separate from
God.
3. Creation is ordered and under the
control of God.
The creation story in the first
chapter of Genesis is the introduction of this theology. The day-by-day
structure of the narrative shows that creation is very systematic and the text
makes it obvious that the true God is the only
one doing the creating. The seven day motif also sets up the Jewish
doctrine of the Sabbath. As an aside, for the scientist, nature being separate
from God allows us to do science!
An interesting
interpretation of Genesis comes from Johnny Miller and John Soden, in their
book, In the Beginning… We Misunderstood.
Miller and Soden show how the main purpose of the Genesis creation account is
to correct the Hebrew people’s improper view of creation that had been
corrupted by 400 years of living in Egypt. They claim that the teachings were
necessary to break free from ancient Egyptian creation myths and teach the
Hebrew nation the correct way to think about the beginning of the universe.
This view does explain why Genesis 1 roughly matches an Egyptian creation myth,
while Genesis 2 has the general pattern of Ancient Near Eastern creation myths.
Genesis is not presenting a new local deity to Israel,
but, as the introduction to the Pentateuch, it is calling for Israel’s absolute
allegiance to God, who claims absolute sovereign control. At the same time, the
account demotes all the gods of Egypt and every other civilization with which
Israel may have contact.[3]
The view that Genesis is
a theological text, with the fact that scholars throughout history have
disagreed on what a creation “day” means, ensures us that a scientist who holds
to the earth being 4.5 million years old can be confident that they are not
“creating a partition in their head” (see January 9th blog entry). Skeptics
can also be certain that to become a Christian does not require you to think
that God created the universe in a week only thousands of years ago.
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